


One Nightmare After Another

by Anonymous



Category: Minecraft (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Fluff and Angst, For the most part, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Karl Jacobs-centric, Karl really needs a hug, Kinda, M/M, Multi, Nightmares, Non-Sexual Intimacy, Polyamory, Quackity needs a hug too, Sapnap likes pet names, Sapnap wants his fiancés to be okay, Sickfic, Temporary Character Death, Unhappy Ending, Vomiting, Vomiting is unrelated to the e.d., Whump, bathing your lover, i think, implied/referenced eating disorder, quackity-centric, toward the end tho
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-02
Updated: 2021-01-02
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:20:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28491552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: L'Manberg is too much pressure for children; too much pressure for adults. Sometimes escape and recognition entails a hefty cost.(Or: Karl is left with the aftermath of his death, Sapnap tries his best to help, Quackity doesn't know how to handle being alone)__________________‡ do not send to any content creators, please‡ read the tags for trigger warnings__________________
Relationships: Alexis | Quackity & Karl Jacobs, Alexis | Quackity & Sapnap, Alexis | Quackity/Karl Jacobs, Alexis | Quackity/Karl Jacobs/Sapnap, Karl Jacobs & Sapnap, Karl Jacobs/Sapnap
Comments: 18
Kudos: 427
Collections: Anonymous





	One Nightmare After Another

**Author's Note:**

> Trigger warnings are in the tags
> 
> Be safe, Happy New Yearning

Karl woke up with heaving breaths and shaking limbs. His head pounded in time with his heart, and his shirt clung to his chest with sweat. 

°•{._._._._._._._._._._._.}•°

_Underneath that shirt sat scars far too big and far too fresh to belong to someone so happy. They stretched up and spiralled around his arms and legs, climbing all the way up to his jaw._

_Later, he would call them pretty, when they were long faded and pale._

_Until then, they stung. They stung like fire burning him and needles piercing him, they stung like being ripped apart, tossed into the air, and slammed back down into the cold, hard earth._

_They were angry and red and raised and pitted and gnarled. They pulled his skin tight and made moving difficult for the first two weeks after he respawned._

_Karl wanted nothing more than to yank them off of his skin._

°•{._._._._._._._._._._._.}•°

It was late out and the sky was pitch black. Sapnap was still asleep. Quackity was in L'Manberg, scaring them both to no end with his mindless plans. Plans which could end in more death than just Karl's, but they both thought that maybe after sacrificing his own fiancé, he'd stop.

Karl threw himself out of bed as his gut twisted in a telltale sign. He made it to the bathroom in record time, and then promptly emptied his stomach of its contents seconds later. He didn't have the energy to do much more than flush the toilet afterward. His head stayed on the hard seat, just in case.

He was so tired, but he couldn't go back to sleep— not with the nightmares. It was enough to physically be blown up and killed once, but his brain was cruel, and insisted on having him relive it nightly. 

The floor was cold. The toilet was cold. The lights were still off. It was too uncomfortable to fall asleep, anyway, he guessed.

He must've been louder than he thought, because Sapnap flicked the lights on a few minutes later, rubbing and worried eyes.

"Karl?" He asked. His voice was still rough from sleep. He crossed the bathroom quickly as Karl turned his head to face his lover.

The brunette waved a heavy arm and presented a half-smile. He didn't feel up to being peppy this early.

"Hey, Sappy-Nappy." He said as Sapnap kneeled next to him. He relished the feeling of a warm hand on his back and leaned into the touch.

Sapnap offered a concerned smile. "Hey, baby, are you okay?"

Karl nodded. "Mhm." He closed his eyes. The cool floor and Sapnap's warm hand seemed to balance him out. 

Sapnap rubbed his back soothingly with the one hand while he lifted the other to brush Karl's hair out of his face. He frowned a little.

"Babe, you're burning up." He spoke softly. "Are you sure you're okay?"

Karl shrugged, but his body protested the movement, and it came out in stuttering intervals.

"Are you going to puke?" 

"Nuh-uh, alr'dy did th't." Karl mumbled. Sapnap frowned deeper.

"You poor thing. I'm gonna start the bath, okay? Let's get you cleaned up and then you're going right back to bed. 'S too early for you to be up."

Sapnap pressed a kiss to Karl's forehead before he stood. Karl whined a little at the sudden lack of contact, to which his partner responded with a hand in his hair. 

"I'm still here, don't worry."

"Pr'mise?"

"I promise." 

Sapnap ran the water. He made sure that it wasn't too hot or too cold as the water rose. When it finally got high enough, he shut off the faucet.

"Can you get in the tub for me, baby? Don't worry about clothes, okay?" The dark haired man asked. Karl nodded absently and climbed into the tub.

He let Sapnap wash his hair, gentle hands threading through brown curls. He peeled Karl's shirt off of his skin and carefully washed his back.

"Are they hurting?" Sapnap knew that even after a body had stitched itself back together, it had the capability to hurt as bad at it had when it got ripped up in the first place.

Karl knew he was talking about the blast scars. He nodded slowly. "Uh-huh." He didn't remember if it was the pain that woke him up or the sick feeling. Maybe it was a nightmare. 

It was probably a nightmare.

Sapnap hummed as he washed Karl off, helping him with his clothes. When the water was drained and Karl was wrapped in a dry towel, Sapnap left to their room to get clean clothes.

He helped Karl dress, and then lead the lanky man back to bed. He kept a hand on his back the entire time.

"C'mon, skinny bean, in you go." 

Karl fell back into bed and let Sapnap toss the blanket over him again. 

"Wh' time's it?" He muttered.

"Late. Quack's gonna be back when you wake up." Sapnap flicked the lights off and climbed into bed. He hugged Karl close. He'd always had a strong immune system and he was not worried about getting sick.

"M'kay." Karl let his eyes shut, but he couldn't fall asleep.

Ten minutes later, Sapnap started playing with his hair. 

"Can't sleep?" He whispered.

"'m scared." Karl didn't have the energy to lie.

"Nightmares?"

"Mhm."

Sapnap hugged him a little tighter. Karl listened to his steady heartbeat. He wrapped spindly arms around the other. He could feel Sapnap's voice rumble in his chest.

"I'm here, babe. Nothing's gonna hurt you anymore. I promise." He said. Karl hugged him tighter.

"I promise. I'm so sorry, Karl. Nothing's gonna hurt you ever again." Sapnap had a feeling that the nightmare was about Karl's death. He'd had the same one over and over again since the event, but this was the first time Sapnap or Quackity had been able to get him to admit it.

"'S okay." Karl spoke, muffled.

Sapnap frowned, because it wasn't okay. Karl always did his best to make sure the other two were happy and safe, and in return, they'd sacrificed him for it. He felt like shit.

"Love you, S'ppy-Nappy." The taller man whispered. 

"Love you too, Karl. Get some sleep, babe." 

"Mhm."

°•{._._._._._._._._._._._.}•°

Quackity returned late in the morning. It was almost noon, but Karl was still sleeping, and Sapnap had resigned himself to laying trapped under the brunette. 

The shortest of the three trudged into their shared bedroom. He was immediately a little concerned. Karl was usually up before all of them— not that Quackity was complaining or anything. The guy needed his sleep.

Sapnap looked up and pressed a finger to his lips, whispering a "Shh."

When Quackity quirked an eyebrow and climbed into the bed on Karl's other side, Sapnap whispered an explanation so soft that it was more of breath than voice.

"He got sick. Finally admitted to having nightmares after a good upchuck." 

Quackity's eyes softened in sympathy. He wove himself into the tangle of his fiancés' limbs.

"Shit." He mumbled. "Is he okay?"

"I dunno. I think he will be." Sapnap replied honestly. "We just gotta be there, you know? Like how he was when we first died."

Quackity nodded. He remembered Karl being there when he woke up from Technoblade's firework. The colorful man had helped him back to health. He'd hugged Quackity when Quackity couldn't stop crying about his death, or Schlatt, or anything, really.

Karl had been there for Sapnap when Dream had killed him, too. Quackity had heard the story. It was almost identical to his own. 

He snorted. "He's like some sort of toothpick pillar of emotional support, huh?" He whispered.

Sapnap nodded. "Yeah." He buried his face in his fiancé's hair. 

Quackity extended his hug across Karl and to Sapnap. It wasn't hard to do. Karl was no bigger than a pencil, he liked to joke. 

Quackity and Sapnap always worried about their lover. He was so, so thin. He'd been targeted before for being so weak-looking. He was always the first injury in a fight. He always laughed it off.

They tried to be as open about their emotions as possible, Karl just always brushed his own to the side in favor of everyone else's. 

Moments where he was truly vulnerable were few and far between. Sapnap was lucky the previous night. He was sure that if he hadn't woken up, Karl would have never told him what had happened, though.

Sapnap closed his eyes and sighed through his nose. "Love you, Quackity." He mumbled. 

Quackity smiled. "Love you too, Sap." He eventually closed his eyes as well.

Karl was firmly stuck in the middle, trapped in a large hug. The coming days would see him forcibly put on bed rest by his lovers. He'd stressed himself into sickness, and they were not going to let him do much else but recover.

All the trio could do was hope that nothing bad would continue to happen. If the situation got worse, they knew they'd be there for each other at the very least.

°•{._._._._._._._._._._._.}•°

_(None of them saw Quackity's spiral coming. Or Sapnap's disappearance. Or Karl's.)_

_(It only got worse.)_

_(They could pretend it didn't. Quackity was a very good actor. He curled up in cold sheets and imagined bony fingers brushing through his hair. He imagined thick-armed hugs.)_

_(He imagined Technoblade's death.)_

_(If the warrior would die, Quackity thought, maybe he could avenge Karl and Sapnap.)_

_(How could a horse's name have him in tears? How come threatening it by name had him curled over a bush?)_

_(Maybe Karl would come back once Technoblade was gone. Maybe Sapnap would come back once Dream was dead.)_

_(Quackity just wanted a hug.)_

**Author's Note:**

> I don't think that we talk about Karl's canon death enough.


End file.
